These decrees were confirmed, Jan. 10,1564, by Pius IV., who had drawn up, based upon them in conjunction with the creeds previously in use, a profession of faith known under his name. See ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. The doctrinal decrees of the council were received at once throughout the western church, a fact which it is necessary to note, as the question as to the reception of the decrees of doctrine has sometimes been confounded with that regarding the decrees of reformation or discipline. As to the latter, delays and reservations took place. The first country to receive the decrees of the council as a whole was the republic of Venice. France accepted the disciplinary decrees only piecemeal and at intervals.
It would be out of place here to enter into the question as to the merits of this unques tionably great and momentous assembly, which may be said to have practically decided the religious destinies of the western church. It is viewed with directly opposite impressions by opposing critics, and it is commonly even said that in the Catholic church itself the council of Trent has met its worst adversary in the person of one of the priest* of its own creed, the Servite monk, Fra Paolo Sarpi.
It must be confessed, however, that the most candid of modern inquirers have shown that Sarpi cannot fairly be regarded as a Roman Catholic. His sympathies are all strongly anti-Roman, and there are abundant indications in his work of a rationalizing tendency, which plainly ought to rank him among the partisans of that free inquiry which it has been the object of Trent to repress by judgment, pronounced once for all, and excluding all controversy. See SARPI. And although there are, perhaps, equal
exceptions againt the impartiality of his rival historian and antagonist, Pallavicino, the latter is admitted by Ranke, Raumer, and others to be far more reliable in the use of documents than his Servite adversary.
The canons and decrees of the council of Trent were issued in Latin, and have been reprinted innumerable times. They have also been translated into almost every modern language; the most approved English translation being that of the Rev. Jeremiah O'Donovan. One of the supplementary works assigned to the pope by the council at its breaking up was the completion of a catechism for the use of parish priests and preach ers. This work has not all the authority of the council, but it is of the very highest credit, and is extensively used, having, like the canons and decrees, been generally translated. Another similar work was the publication of an authentic edition of the Vulgate version of the Bible, as well as of the missal and breviary. All these have been accomplished at intervals; and there is besides at Rome a permanent tribunal, a con gregation of cardinals, styled Congregatio Interpres Concilii Tridentini, to which belongs the duty of dealing with all questions which arise as to the meaning, the authority, or the effect of the canons and decrees of this celebrated council. See SARPI, Pius IV.,